


Stage Fright

by susurrusshivers



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Anxiety, Awkward Kageyama Tobio, Embarrassed Kageyama Tobio, Facing Fears, Fear, Fluff, Gen, Hidden Talents, Karasuno Family, Minor Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio, Singing, kisses maybe but i'm not sure, takes place before their gay realization
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-11-23
Packaged: 2018-07-28 13:49:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7643053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/susurrusshivers/pseuds/susurrusshivers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Karasuno volleyball team learns that, surprisingly, Kageyama has talents that lie outside of volleyball. One of these is his damn good singing voice.</p><p>Thus sparks their attempts to get Kageyama to join the drama club.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to finish this 300 years ago but alas, twas not to be~
> 
> There used to be this thing on Kageyama's wiki page that said 'there are rumors that Kageyama is actually a good singer' and that's what this story is about. Idk why but they took it off the page :(

Karasuno volleyball club was a tightly-knit group made up of varying personalities, each with their own strengths, weaknesses, and talents. The deeper one looked, the more secrets and surprises there were to find. 

They were diverse and unique in their abilities. Sugawara was actually a remarkably good cook, bringing in snacks in for the team every now and then and passing them off as his mother’s cooking – with only Daichi and Asahi knowing the wiser. Asahi liked reading romantic novels in secret, and he passed off the ones he thought were good to Shimizu and Yachi, who both liked to do the same. Daichi could do magic tricks but never did them in front of the team anymore because Tanaka and Nishinoya got a little _too_ excited when the captain made a packet of salt ‘disappear’, and they spent the next ten minutes screaming about it and received detentions for disturbing fellow students. Tsukishima could play the trombone, an ability that he forced others who knew to keep quiet about. Yamaguchi was talented at writing stories, Hinata could down ten meat buns in three minutes, and Yachi could draw realistic portraits. Shimizu had practiced kendo before assisting the volleyball club, Tanaka could burp Japan’s national anthem, Nishinoya could balance absurdly heavy objects on his nose, and Ennoshita made short films during his free time. 

It seemed everyone had their own little thing except for… _Kageyama._

No one questioned that he had skill when it came to volleyball; it was very obvious to any observer that he was quite gifted when it came to the sport. Apart from volleyball and being good at memorizing things (about volleyball), no one could really pinpoint any other talents they knew of. This was likely choked up to the fact that Kageyama was a pretty private person, but even in spite of that, the club thought they might learn just a _little_ bit more about him since they all spent so much time together.

It was never really voiced audibly amongst the team, but somehow it unanimously became everyone’s goal to work together and find out the dirt on the young setter. Hinata, the one who spent the most time with Kageyama, also was the most adamant to find what he was hiding. For the most part Hinata felt like he had Kageyama figured out pretty well, but even _he_ couldn’t predict the things he’d find.

The first hints were subtle, yet surprising.

On the bus to and from games, Kageyama sometimes liked to listen to music. More than a few times Hinata had caught the setter mouthing words to a song, and he had honestly found it funny to begin with, because Kageyama just didn’t seem like the type of person to do that kind of thing. It was only after Tsukishima caught Kageyama doing it once and taunted him about it for a while that the setter was embarrassed enough to never do it again. It was enough to pique Hinata’s curiosity, however.

His searching lead him to discovering more. After an evening of practice one Friday, Daichi had started everyone on cleanup. Tsukishima and Yamaguchi were working to take down the net while Kageyama and Hinata pulled out the mops from the supply room to do a few rounds of the gym. Usually they would race to see who could finish cleaning up first, but Kageyama was too zoned out to even notice Hinata taking off without him and aggressively mopping up the gym. 

Instead, Kageyama strolled leisurely with mop in front, completely off in his own world. Hinata eyed him curiously from across the gym, tempted to taunt his setter but far too weirded out by Kageyama’s behavior to do so. In the end Hinata chose to ignore him, assuming that his teammate must’ve just needed some space, that is, until he heard _it._

The sound was enough to cause more than a few to pause their actions and stare a moment, because it was such a strange thing to behold _Kageyama Tobio humming to himself_ as though there were no one else around to observe him doing so. It was odd, and perhaps a touch out of character for what someone might typically expect from Kageyama. But other than that… it didn’t sound all that bad. Perhaps the biggest shock should have been that Kageyama actually could carry a tune. 

“Isn’t that the welcome jingle they play at Family Mart?” Tsukishima taunted, thoroughly bringing Kageyama out of his dazed stupor with his words. 

The setter’s ears and cheeks turned red as he sputtered for the right words. “I… it wasn’t… I–”

“Of all the things to hum, you pick a _convenience store song?_ ” Tsukishima continued, chuckling, “I’d like to say I’m surprised, but I’m really not.”

Kageyama only reddened further. 

“To be fair, it’s a pretty catchy tune,” Hinata chimed in, “It gets stuck in my head all the time!” He then copied Kageyama by humming the tune himself.

Tsukishima just stared at the tiny decoy, slight amusement present on his features. “No wonder you two hang out all the time,” he finally drawled, then tugged the net down the rest of the way and hauled it off with Yamaguchi. 

And so, Kageyama was never seen humming again.

At this point, most were suspicious that Kageyama was hiding something, but it was obviously something the setter didn’t want anyone knowing about. That, in turn, made everyone even more curious. Hinata liked to speculate about what Kageyama was hiding with the other players, throwing out ideas from the crazy to the average, but he never thought Kageyama’s secret would be what it actually was. It wasn’t until the blaring truth of it all smacked everyone upside the head that they finally chose to recognize it properly. It took an outside source to bring everything to light.

It was during another dull English class when Hinata was leaked some information. He had been ‘working’ on a handout his teacher had passed around when two girls from his class approached his desk, looking at him eagerly. “Hey, Hinata-kun?”

He glanced at them. “Hm? What is it?” 

“You’re friends with Kageyama-kun, right? In Class 3?” one of them asked.

“Yeah,” he confirmed, “Why? Do you need him for something?” 

She looked to her friend for what Hinata assumed was assurance. They shared a look with each other, nodding, and turned back to Hinata. “Do you think you might be able to get him to try out for the drama club?”

Hinata’s face screwed up in confusion. Drama club? _Kageyama?_ The grumpy-faced, hot-headed, antisocial Kageyama? That couldn’t be right. Hinata chuckled good-naturedly at the idea. “Um, I’m not sure that’s really his thing… I don’t really see him as being a good actor.”

“Oh, really?” She cocked her head to the side. “He’s a good singer though, isn’t he?”

Hinata’s brows shot up to his forehead. “Where did you hear that?”

“Oh um, a friend of ours – she’s in the same class as him. After school she saw him walking down the hall towards the gym, and he was singing. She said she was surprised to hear it coming from him, but she was also _very_ impressed.” The girl smiled sheepishly. “She wanted to ask him to try out at the upcoming auditions, but… she’s sort of intimidated by him. That’s sort of where you come in…” 

“Huh.” Hinata relaxed into his seat, his curiosity brewing. Kageyama could sing? Since when? “I didn’t know he could sing,” he admitted.

The girls looked surprised. “Really? Aren’t you two close?”

“I think so,” Hinata supplied, sort of unsure of it himself, “He’s sort of quiet about a lot of things. You really have to keep bugging him if you ever want him to do or tell you something.” 

“Do you think you could ask him about it?” the girls pressured, “At least maybe get him to consider trying out for the show?”

Hinata shrugged lamely. Even if all of this about Kageyama being a good singer was true, getting him to ever talk about it was going to be a tough hill to climb. However, Hinata found himself nodding slowly. “I’ll see what I can do, but I won’t make any promises yet!”

It was a good thing he didn’t, because Hinata’s attempts to spark something with Kageyama revolving around singing or drama club or anything related just earned the decoy a blank, wary stare from his setter. He tried goading Kageyama into singing by bursting out into song during practice, and enthusiastically pointing to Kageyama to sing the next part, but the setter never did and only ever opened his mouth to call Hinata a ‘fucking dumbass’ and yell at him to focus.

Hinata even brought the upperclassmen in on his attempts to try and pressure Kageyama into doing something, but every time they’d ‘casually’ play a popular song during break which made most of the team either sing or dance around like idiots, Kageyama would just stand very awkwardly by the benches near Tsukishima and watch them, a look of extreme discomfort on his face. 

Hinata was starting to get stressed out with each futile attempt. He really, _really_ wanted to hear Kageyama sing. It was practically killing him at this point that Kageyama was being so stubborn about not singing. Hinata didn’t get it. They were friends right? Why wouldn’t Kageyama feel comfortable singing around a friend? Hinata did it all the time, and he wasn’t even a great singer. Mediocre, at best. But Hinata wasn’t ashamed of it. Singing was fun, so he did it. It didn’t matter whether he sounded amazing or not.

Well, it seemed the things Hinata wanted were always going to come unexpectedly.

Another practice had ended for the evening. Unfortunately Daichi couldn’t stick around to monitor clean-up, so he was looking to pass off the keys to a willing volunteer.

“I’ll do it!” Hinata offered immediately.

Daichi eyed the ebullient first year warily. “Are you sure you can handle it?”

“Yeah! No problem!” Hinata replied eagerly. “You can even make Kageyama stick around if you’re worried!”

“Don’t just offer people up to do things, dumbass Hinata!” Kageyama yelled from across the gym. 

Hinata ignored the setter and looked at Daichi hopefully. Daichi sighed heavily at the look in the decoy’s eyes. “Fine. But don’t stick around too long. I know you’re going to try and practice more, but you need to be out of here before it gets too dark.”

“Got it!” Hinata nabbed the keys from Daichi’s hand before he could change his mind about it, then returned to cheerfully cleaning the gym whilst bothering Kageyama about staying back for more tosses. Hinata was thoroughly cussed out by his setter but ultimately, Kageyama relented and agreed, but on the grounds that Hinata would also work on his shitty receives. 

About ten minutes after everyone else had left, Hinata tugged Kageyama by the arm to come and practice with him. They barely got in five minutes when Hinata’s phone rang and abruptly ended the session as Hinata scurried over to the benches to answer it.

“Hello? Oh, hey mom,” Hinata spoke into the receiver. “Hm, oh, no I haven’t left yet.” There was a pause, and Hinata flinched and pulled the phone from his ear at the increase in volume of his mother’s voice. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I totally forgot! Yeah, I’m leaving right now! Sorry!” He hung up and tossed the phone in his bag hastily and rushed to grab his things.

“Something wrong?” Kageyama questioned.

Hinata slumped his bag over his shoulder and turned to face his partner. “I totally forgot about it but, my mom wants me to look after my little sister since she won’t be back ‘till late…”

Kageyama’s eyes narrowed. “Dumbass! How the hell could you forget about your sister?”

“I don’t know!” Hinata defended, throwing his hands up in surrender, “My mom asked me right as I was going out the door and it just slipped my mind!” He scrambled over to the door and turned to toss Kageyama the keys. “I’m sorry, but can you lock up?”

Kageyama sighed, catching the keys easily. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t worry about it. Just get home.”

Hinata clapped his hands together and smiled. “Thank you so much Kageyama!” Then he rushed out the door without a single glance back. His feet slapped loudly against the ground as he hurried towards the bike racks near the entrance, and rustled through his bag for the key to his bicycle lock. He rummaged around for a good while, but it wasn’t there. Did it fall out of his bag?

Hinata retraced his steps back to the gym, carefully inspecting the ground as he went. It wasn’t anywhere to be seen on the ground outside, so it must’ve still been in the gym. Hinata reached for the door standing ajar, but paused at a sound. Could that really be…? 

Hinata quietly crept up to the open door and peeked his head through the crack. His breath left his lungs in a heavy, quick rush while his eyes hurried to comprehend just what he was seeing. 

Singing. Kageyama was _actually_ singing. 

It was some song Hinata didn’t know but sounded really quite beautiful in a sort of somber, melancholy way. The echo of Kageyama’s voice reverberated from the storage closet and into the gym – his deep, raw vocals filling the open, empty space. Hinata could only stand stunned at the sound because it _was_ good – better than good – _amazing_ , actually. Kageyama sounded so impassioned as he sang – every word held such strong a emotion and tugged at something deep inside Hinata that he couldn’t quite place. Kageyama’s voice picked up as he hit higher notes and Hinata could feel his skin prickle as goosebumps formed all over his arms and legs. Kageyama’s voice was really… breathtaking.

The vaguest sounds of footsteps sounded underneath the singing, yet Hinata didn’t register them. He was far too distracted by the enchanting song. Kageyama’s voice surrounded him, leaving Hinata captivated and entranced until it suddenly trailed off, and the almost inaudible sound of Kageyama cursing roused Hinata from his stupor. He looked back towards the storage room, and there Kageyama stood, his face paling quick as he stared at Hinata like the decoy was the most offensive being he had ever laid eyes upon. He had one earbud in and one out, the end of the cord trailing into his jacket pocket.

“H-How long have you been there?” Kageyama stuttered, his face going red.

Hinata picked at the hem of his shirt. He rocked back and forth on his feet, avoiding Kageyama’s eyes. “Um, a little while.”

“Fucking hell–” Kageyama ripped the other headphone out of his ear and shoved it into his pocket. He slammed the doors to the storage room closed and stormed over to where Hinata stood. He shot the decoy a scathing look, but it wasn’t that scary really, since his face and ears were still red. He just looked like a petulant child. Kageyama picked up his bag by the door and threw it over his shoulder. He flicked the gym lights off and shoved a fearful Hinata out the door along with him. 

“Ah! Uh, Kageyama! I left my–” 

“Kneepads. I know,” Kageyama grumbled, then unzipped his bag and pulled out Hinata’s forgotten kneepads. 

“Oh…” Hinata took the item from Kageyama’s hands. He hadn’t even realized his kneepads were missing too. “I was actually going to say my keys…” Hinata trailed off awkwardly, but Kageyama held up a hand to silence him. 

Kageyama shoved his other hand into his bag again, and pulled out a very familiar key-ring. He glared at Hinata and he ungracefully threw the keys at Hinata without warning. “You’re a fucking dumbass,” he grumbled, then turned and locked up the gym. Kageyama didn’t spare another glance at the dumbfounded boy as turned and walked briskly past Hinata, clearly wanting out of there as soon as possible. Hinata trailed him.

“Kageyama–” 

“Don’t talk to me.”

“Wha– why not?”

The tips of Kageyama’s ears turned redder. “Just… don’t.”

“Are you embarrassed?” The lack of response gave Hinata his answer. “You don’t need to be. It was really good.”

“Shut up. Please, okay?”

Hinata quickened his pace so he was in front of Kageyama. He walked backwards, trying to make eye contact with his setter. “I’m not kidding! That was really, really incredible! Why didn’t you ever tell me you could sing so well?”

“Because it doesn’t matter.” 

“But it’s such a cool talent!” Hinata persisted. “I mean, if I could sing half as good as you, I’d do it all the time.”

Kageyama scoffed. “You already sing all the time anyway.”

“Yeah, but, at least I’d sound good if I was like you.” 

“You don’t sound bad.”

Hinata sputtered, half-laughing. “Liar. Stop trying to be nice.”

“I wasn’t,” Kageyama retorted simply. Hinata’s stomach twisted strangely at that. Not in a sick kind of way, but just a _weird_ one. He just sort of stopped his walking at Kageyama’s words, feeling oddly flustered at his honesty, but causing Kageyama to come crashing right into him and nearly knocking him to the ground. “Dumbass, what the hell are you doing?” Kageyama snarled.

Hinata quickly regained his balance and his bearings. “Sorry. You just… took me by surprise. I wasn’t expecting you to say that.”

Kageyama stared at him a moment, looking extremely embarrassed and blatantly awkward. “Shouldn’t you be home right now?” he mumbled, and Hinata gasped. 

“I should!” Hinata panicked, rushing away towards the bikes racks once again. “Uh – I’ll catch you tomorrow, Kageyama!”

Hinata could feel Kageyama’s eyes on his back as he pedaled away, but was too far away to hear Kageyama mutter, _“I really, really hope you don’t.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I needed to jolt myself from my writing block so I found this super old piece and am working on finishing it up to get back in the flow. This is gonna be a short little fic guys but I hope you enjoy it. <3
> 
> Totally forgot to add this, but [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3xM38BgxEI) is the song I based Kageyama's singing in the chapter off of. It's not a Japanese song cause I don't really listen to Japanese music and would have no clue what to use. ┐(ﾟ～ﾟ)┌


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoops forgot about this my bad

It had been a week since ‘the incident’, as Hinata had started calling it. Since then, Kageyama had taken to being a stupid, stubborn idiot and wouldn’t even give Hinata the time of day anymore. He’d stopped racing Hinata to school, and at practice he wouldn’t send Hinata any tosses when he called for them and made a point to avoid any conversation Hinata would spark up. He’d started showing up to class at the last minute to avoid running into Hinata in the halls and he’d stopped spending his lunch period with him. He didn’t walk home with Hinata after school either. It hurt Hinata’s feelings every time Kageyama would catch eyes with him and purposely halt his steps to head in the other direction, or how he would dodge Hinata’s excitable calls and hasten away from him as quickly as possible, cheeks blossoming crimson.

Hinata didn’t think it was fair that he was being punished over a little curiosity. Sure, Kageyama had been _a little_ embarrassed when Hinata had caught him in the act, and _maybe_ Hinata had previously been crossing several boundaries for a while in order to dig up Kageyama’s dirt, but he really didn’t think his newfound knowledge of Kageyama’s singing ability should be rewarded with the silent treatment. He wanted to hear _more_ , not lose Kageyama’s voice entirely. 

He didn’t really understand how Kageyama could really blame him for wanting to know more. It was hard not to be intrigued by Kageyama when the setter was always so private about his life outside of volleyball – it’s like he was just begging Hinata to start snooping. On top of that, Kageyama had such a _cool_ hidden talent and it was natural for Hinata to be a little (or a lot) amazed by it. He was even a little jealous – not that Kageyama ever needed to know that.

It seemed only natural to Hinata that they would share their secrets with each other. Kageyama was his (best?) friend, and as far as Hinata was concerned, friends shared everything with each other. That’s just the way it worked.

To Kageyama, apparently, this was not the case. Of course this baffled Hinata beyond all means. He wasn’t sure if Kageyama’s reluctance to share more personal information was because of his stingy personality or because Kageyama didn’t completely understand what ‘friendship’ meant. From what Hinata could gather from the bits of Kageyama’s past he knew about, friends hadn’t exactly been easy for Kageyama to come by. Maybe he just didn’t know what to do with a friend like Hinata. Maybe he just didn’t know how to trust someone.

Hinata sighed in his seat. He wasn’t exactly paying much attention to the lecture; it was English class, and paying attention wasn’t going to help him understand the absurdity of the language any more than he was already failing to do. He leaned back and fixed his eyes on a brightly colored poster pinned to the bulletin board at the back of his classroom. Atop the flyer in bold, red lettering the drama club advertised its auditions in two weeks’ time for the musical they were putting on this year. Hinata stiffened.

Two weeks. He had two weeks to convince Kageyama to try out for the drama club. How on earth was he going to do that when Kageyama wasn’t even looking at him anymore, much less speaking to him? He had royally pissed his partner off, and from Hinata’s past experience with Kageyama’s anger, it could be like pulling teeth to get him feeling happy again. 

At lunch, Hinata ate with Yachi while she tutored him in his worst subjects. Kageyama would normally show up during these lessons too because he was just as much of an idiot as Hinata was, but ever since _the incident_ he had abruptly stopped coming. Hinata could bet that Kageyama’s purposeful avoidance was definitely costing him in the educational department. It wouldn’t surprise him to hear that Kageyama was doing worse in his subjects now thanks to skipping Yachi’s tutoring. 

_‘I hope he’s failing math,’_ Hinata thought in sadistic amusement, _‘It would serve him right for avoiding me like this.’_ He hoped karma nailed Kageyama good.

“Um, Hinata,” Yachi began, shaking him from his thoughts, “Did you hear what I said? The answer to number seven, do you know it?”

“Oh, sorry Yachi,” he apologized, quickly searching for the number they were on, “I wasn’t listening. Just one sec – sorry about that.”

Yachi’s watched him, his expression flustered from being caught off guard, and her expression fell concerned. Something had definitely seemed off with Hinata lately. “You’ve seemed… preoccupied, lately,” she noted, “Are you okay?”

Hinata shrugged, his eyes falling a little downcast. “I’ve just had too much on my mind, I guess.”

“Oh…” She paused. “C-Can I ask what’s been bothering you?”

Hinata sighed. He dropped his pencil and stared at his notebook, at his messy, almost indecipherable handwriting. “It’s Kageyama,” he finally said. “He won’t talk to me anymore.”  
Yachi’s face crumpled. “Y-You guys aren’t having another fight are you?” she tentatively asked. She worried her lip between her teeth. The last time Hinata and Kageyama had fought it had been really ugly, both of them walking out bruised and battered, and neither would speak to the other for what felt like eternity. Yachi hated thinking that they might be in such an awful place again. 

“No, not really,” Hinata murmured, though he wasn’t really completely sure that was the case. He liked to think Kageyama wouldn’t grow so angry about Hinata overhearing his singing, but he wasn’t sure just how sensitive the subject was to Kageyama. “You know how everyone’s been trying to get Kageyama to sing?” he asked. Yachi nodded. “Well, I actually heard him singing a few nights ago, and now he won’t let me near him. He got all flustered knowing I’d heard him.”

“Oh,” Yachi said blankly. “Well… maybe he doesn’t want anyone to hear him because he doesn’t think he’s good?”

“But he _is_ good, Yachi!” Hinata protested, “Like… really, really good! And I told him that!” 

“Well, maybe he’s just shy,” she offered instead. 

Hinata’s brows furrowed in a funny kind of way. His tone was incredulous, “Kageyama? Shy?” Kageyama _couldn’t_ be shy. Just saying it out loud sounded silly. 

In Hinata’s eyes, Kageyama oozed confidence in his every step. He was a fiercely determined kind of guy who knew what he wanted and wouldn’t settle for anything less than the best. He could be awkward sometimes for sure, but Hinata would never call him timid or shy. He was a bit emotionally constipated and sucked at conversation, but there was a big difference between not knowing the proper thing to say versus being timid and nervous around other people. 

“It could just be performance anxiety,” Hinata reasoned. “I mean, I get anxious before games all the time. It’s called stage fright, I think.” 

Yachi shrugged. “Maybe. You should ask him about it.”

Hinata laughed in a hopeless kind of way. “I wish it was that easy, Yachi. I can’t even corner him most of the time. Getting Kageyama to have a conversation with me while he’s like this would be a miracle.”

She quieted at that, thinking. Yachi hated it when the duo fell into their stubborn ways and wouldn’t search for a solution to their disagreements – it brought both Hinata and Kageyama down when they weren’t getting along, and often enough the rest of the team would vibe off of their bad energy and the whole club would be out of whack. Sometimes those two didn’t realize just how much sway they had over everyone else. 

“You could try finding him at lunch!” she proposed. “I-I mean, if he’s eating, he’ll be stuck and won’t be able to quickly run away from you!”

Hinata gasped, jolting out of his seat with excitement. “That’s true!” he exclaimed, then his voice fell off into quiet as he thought about it. “I’d just have to find wherever he’s hiding out during lunch… I don’t know where he’s going…”

“Well, once you do that, it should be easy right?”

Hinata shrugged. He supposed he’d just have to find out.

 

* * *

The next day passed much the same as those prior had – Kageyama’s avoidance habits had not changed. Hinata hadn’t really expected them to. But he also knew that today was going to end differently than any other day this past week, because now he had a plan. Kageyama wasn’t going to escape him any longer.

Hinata was a bundle of nerves through his morning classes, his eyes were kept trained on the clock as he anxiously awaited for it to strike noon. He was only chewed out once by his teachers for ignoring the lesson, which was better than anything he could have hoped for in this situation. When the clock’s small hand finally creeped its way around to land on the twelve, Hinata sprang from his seat as the bell rang for lunch. He wasted no time in bolting out of his classroom, bag in hand as he made a beeline down the halls towards Kageyama’s classroom, fully intent of catching his friend before he’d have a chance to run off.

When he arrived, all primed and ready to haul Kageyama off for questioning, his target was missing from the room. Hinata’s eyes fervently searched the class of unfamiliar students looking for Kageyama’s scary face, coming up short every time. Hinata groaned in irritation. It looked like Kageyama had beaten him to the punch. How typical.  
But Hinata wasn’t one to give up so easily. 

He quickly approached a student sitting at a desk near the door, the boy just reaching into his bag to pull out his lunch. “Hey,” Hinata started, drawing the guy’s attention, “do you know where Kageyama went? You know: tall, stupid haircut, scary face?”

“Oh,” the boy said, like Hinata’s description had triggered realization, “You just missed him. He was out of here before the bell even went off. It looked like he was heading towards the gym.”

“Thanks!” Hinata called over his shoulder, already out the door and hustling down the hall. He figured he might as well check the gym first, and he silently swore under his breath that if Kageyama was there he was going to lose it because he could’ve _at least_ picked a less obvious spot, the stupid idiot.

Upon arriving outside, Hinata quickly ran for the gym. He tried the door but found it locked. Kageyama couldn’t be inside. Hinata glanced about his surroundings. He circled behind the gym, glancing around the corner to check and see if Kageyama was there. He almost groaned because _yes_ , Kageyama _was_ there and it was so absurdly obvious that he would be and Hinata wanted to smack himself upside the head for it. He stared at Kageyama’s lonesome figure a moment, the setter’s legs crossed and his back against the concrete wall, chowing down on his packed lunch.

_‘So eating alone was better than eating with me?’_ Hinata wondered bitterly. His lips twisted into a childish pout, and he stormed up to Kageyama with his own lunch in hand and stubbornly plopped down next to him. Kageyama jumped in surprise at the body appearing next to him suddenly, looking poised to bolt when he realized that it was Hinata.

Hinata gripped onto Kageyama’s uniform, preventing him from running. He looked up at him with watery eyes full of hurt and accusation. “You’ve been avoiding me,” he said, the upset clear in his voice. 

“…No?” Kageyama replied hesitantly, the lie fully evident.

Hinata sniffled and Kageyama visibly flinched. “You have, you big… big stupid butthead!” he yelled, his voice cracking.

Kageyama probably would have laughed if Hinata wasn’t on the brink of tears right now. Seeing Hinata cry always freaked him out – he never knew how he was supposed to handle Hinata’s tears and he almost always ended up saying something that made things worse. He wasn’t good at this ‘comforting’ stuff. He just stared blankly as Hinata unwrapped his lunch around a medley of snotty sniffles, the tiny decoy doing his best to not totally crack open the waterworks. Hinata was clearly hurt but was doing his best not to show it, and failing pretty darn well at it. 

“Wh-why have you been avoiding me?” Hinata asked, his mouth full of rice and pickled vegetables.

“I felt really awkward…” Kageyama admitted slowly. He too, picked up his lunch again. “Everything is all weird… now that you know…”

“How is it weird? It’s not like you were doing something freaky.”

Kageyama didn’t answer.

Hinata stared at him, and took a moment to swallow his food. Kageyama looked like some had just stuck him with a needle, what with the way his face had twisted up into an ugly grimace. “I really think you should audition for the drama club,” Hinata finally said.

Kageyama froze. He was halfway through shoveling some food into his mouth, and Hinata thought he looked kind of silly just sitting there, food pressed against his lips but not going anywhere. He was giving Hinata some _massive_ side-eye, all full of shock and upset and disgust at the mere suggestion of ‘joining the drama club’.

“Hell no,” he growled, finally moving from his stiff position to glare at Hinata properly.

“Why not?” Hinata whined, draping his body over Kageyama’s lap like a child throwing a temper tantrum. Kageyama stiffened under Hinata’s weight, using his elbows to shove the smaller body off of him. “I know it seems weird,” Hinata grunted as his body met the ground, “but like, you’d be super good for it! You’d totally get a part–”

Kageyama made a disgusted noise. “Definitely not, Hinata. Never.”

“Yeah you would, grumpy pants! You’re really talented; of course they’d pick you!”

“I meant no to the entire thing, Hinata. I wasn’t being specific to getting a part in anything. I don’t care about that. I’m against the _whole_ idea.”

Hinata pouted, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re so boring!”

“I don’t care.”

“Boring Kageyama!” Hinata yelled loudly into the afternoon air. Some students sitting on a bench a short distance away stared at him oddly, but he didn’t seem to care because he kept yelling. “So lifeless! So dull! So lackluster!” 

Kageyama narrowed his eyes at his partner. “Will you shut up?” he spat.

“Boring Kageyamaaa!!!” Hinata yelled into the Kageyama’s ear, causing him to recoil from the shear loudness of his voice. 

“Stop it, dumbass!” Kageyama yelled back. He made an attempt to grab Hinata’s hair so he could squeeze the life out of him, but the decoy was too quick and danced away from his grip. 

“So, so _boring~_ ” Hinata sang, the pitiful pouting gone and a wide grin taking its place. “SO BORING–”

Kageyama clapped a hand over Hinata’s mouth to muffle his yells. “Just stop so I can say something!” he ordered. His other hand to gripped Hinata’s wrists and Kageyama tugged him back down to a sitting position. He could feel Hinata grin victoriously against his palm, and the feel of Hinata’s smile against his skin was enough for him to quickly rip his hand back, his body shuddering at the ghost of Hinata’s lips on his hand. Hinata gazed up at Kageyama curiously with eyes full of mock-innocence, and Kageyama felt his lip curl – ready to throw a biting remark Hinata’s way. He only barely managed to reign himself in. “Listen,” Kageyama began, “I don’t–I don’t like being in front of other p-people when I… you know…”

“Sing? Kageyama, it’s not a bad word, you can say ‘sing.’” 

“I don’t like talking about it,” he hissed.

Hinata curiously cocked his head to the side. “Are you shy?” Kageyama didn’t really reply, but the tips of his ears turned red in admission. Hinata grinned devilishly. “Oooo…” he drawled, his tone filled with a childish victory over finding out information meant to be kept secret. “Yachi was right! You _are_ shy!”

“I’m not shy, dumbass,” Kageyama grit out, his cheeks pinking now, “I just… get nervous. Like when you puke before our matches.” 

Hinata pursed his lips at the remark – a low dig, but he’d let it slide in favor of raising Kageyama’s hackles even more. He’d never seen him so flustered before. “So you feel like you might puke if you sang in front of other people?” he asked.

Kageyama shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m not gonna try.”

“You didn’t puke when I heard you sing, though.” 

“That’s different! I didn’t know you were there!”

Hinata’s crossed his arms over his chest, frowning. “Well why can’t you just pretend no one’s there all the time?”

“Are you stupid? That’s impossible to do, dumbass.”

Hinata leaned back against the wall of the school building, pouting at the quick shut-down. It was evidently obvious now that Kageyama clearly had some level of stage fright, but Hinata was baffled as to why. He’d always known criticism would make Kageyama work harder to improve, at least when it came to volleyball. But Hinata had never criticized Kageyama’s singing; he’d only expressed his amazement of it. Kageyama _was_ a good singer. Why would he be afraid of singing if he didn’t have to worry about sounding bad and being criticized for it? 

Even if Kageyama was bad at singing, that certainly shouldn’t stop him from doing it. Hinata wasn’t that great at singing either but he still did it all the time _because it was fun._ Why wouldn’t Kageyama feel the same? He definitely seemed to like singing from the passion Hinata had heard in his voice that night, but he wasn’t allowing himself to enjoy it like he could. Kageyama’s nerves were getting the best of him, a feeling Hinata knew all too well. Hinata felt a little bad, knowing that Kageyama could feel that same gut-clenching anxiety he often felt when there was a lot on the line. It certainly made him seem much more… empathetic.

As Hinata stared a Kageyama’s brooding face, an idea burst into his mind. “I can train you!” he exclaimed, “I can help you get over your nervousness!”

Kageyama blanched. “W-what? You can’t even get over your own nerves, what makes you think–”

Hinata clapped a hand over Kageyama’s mouth. “I so can, Kageyama-kun, and you’re going to watch me do it.” He leaned in close. “My house. This Friday. Six-o-clock,” he said. “We’ve got two weeks to get you ready for the auditions and I swear I’m gonna get you in there!”

Kageyama swallowed against Hinata’s sweaty palm. His eyes flickered with something akin to fear, and his stomach twisted in a gross, sick kind of way. He shouldn’t do this, he knew it was an absolutely awful idea and Hinata would probably ridicule him the entire time he was there, but something swirling in his partner’s auric gaze told Kageyama that he didn’t have much of choice.

Hinata was going to fix him and Kageyama couldn’t say no.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm pretty horrible at everything, I know. sorry I let this one go for so long holy shit. Also, the story is gonna be a bit longer than I originally anticipate, hope that's okay.
> 
> [And I have another Kageyama song to listen to if you like.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTpZdfm7iuk)
> 
> Have a lovely day <3


End file.
